It's an odd feeling
When you realize
that if given a map, a pin, and a
question.

You would just stand there
staring
Still wondering where home is.

I haven't written in months, as I avoid running into you in my thoughts
I was trying to forget you, but I realize that you appear nonetheless
Just there at my most vulnerable when my mind flounders over the past
There you remain and lie in wait
knowing your presence leads to
dominance.

I abhor you for interfering with my thoughts
As I approach the fall into a slumber you are there
In unforeseen trickles that cause my eyes to slam open
Your slow creep brings the wash of shame and the grip of fear

Shame, in that I let you treat me the way you did
And that I didn't run, but remained standing beside you
After humorous encounters turned to frightening obedience
Pain became the game for you as I struggled to gain my footing

Wicked smiles made my heartbeat far too fast
As I tried to anticipate your needs to avoid an unjustified punishment
Or at least a less severe grip of your hands and the bruises that followed
As they strained to grip tightly to inflict your own sorrow

As I spin through the whirlwind of memories, they leave me stilled
For I cannot seem to recall a time with you that wasn't painful
Emotionally crippling or fearfully violent, I shudder at the moments
That I thought I was in love.

I can't remember not falling
Swirling lights waver magnificently
Enticing thoughts into a fine mosaic
That you and I no longer hear

Yet, my ears strain for
That ticklish melody
Who held sunrises and sunflowers
in time capsules of devious accord

Drawn by its wolfish howls
And dangerous tenacity
Oh, how painless it was
to slip on that second skin

Though, its removal was
far from godly
and no stranger to malice
unmasked the anguished well-wisher

As onus pined for its keeper
While doubt feathered the weary
Laying its soft touches
on bruised shoulders
That lost the will to carry the weight
of your unknowns.

I am the queen of the unfinished
series, conversations, books, hearts, and paintings
are the few that lie in my wake

Breadcrumbs that can't be followed
the trail that offensively goes cold
Yet, all I have been told

Is that I am
Just an instantaneous tornado
That leaves everyone reeling.

I used to love yellow roses
yet, as they contour the sides
of your appreciatively closed box
I silently scorn them

As inappropriate laughter bubbles from my lips
and enraged stares take self-preserving aim
at a selfish girl, in rumpled clothes
deficient in all anticipated signs of sorrow

Who's mind wandered to the arching rafters
With a single selfish utterance, distorted with frustration
that someone so detached could effortlessly ruin
my favorite flower.

It is safe to say you have unraveled
In a way some may view as cumbersome
I can only find brilliance
for what remains is just short of divine (carefree?)

As your head touches down
the moonlight plays its infamous part
Of bathing the admired in a immortalizing glow
while the nights symphony lulls  

Anxiousness no longer lingers your brow
And your hands lay luxuriously still
While dreams take your eyes
to what I hope to be safer shores
than those I know you to have already traveled

I find it strange
The cracks that surface
when silence rules the air
and solitude the heart

As the previously scoffed
transforms its cruelty into
realization of obvious avoidance
oh, the fangs from that muffled shroud

Yet, in this place
where trickles of thoughts
become raging rivers
that bear too much burden
and burst the dam of denial

Peace can be found
for in this underwater funhouse
Reflections can become guides
that will lead (me & you) back to self

Come now, spill your secrets
on this slowly rising floor
paint me in your misdeeds
for I am craving new colors

flickering eyes expose fresh
hesitancy that lingers clearly
upon untasted tongue
that (despairingly) longs for freedom

unfurl cold nuiscances
they hold no power here
come, proclaim your hidden inquiries
while we’ll decorate these steel walls
in our variegated offences

These cold months leave me haggard
Breathless, as I struggle to regain my grip
Slipping through plains of uncertainty
Seeking that evasive simplicity

Scoffing at past words of comfort
That so gallantly wrapped the falsehood
Of time and its fabled curative powers
How I have been eagerly deceived

Jaded breath travels forward
Seeking concord in old and battered retentions
To only be limited by brooding reality
Where lays my pool of forgetting?

Utterances wisp past insistently
Avowing it to be just beyond
While others toy and slowly slither
Hissing of its non-existence

By miscalculating step I fumble
Mind drained of all, but shelled rummage
As it seeps into my frame
Ever hunting that eradicating amnesia

I think I've been a little lost lately.
Maybe more than a little.
This dull ache takes shape of your voice.
It lulls and tugs repeating familiar soothings

Past words of comfort now are readily sharpened
As I close my eyes and attempt to drift
Yet, I am tethered to the waking hours
How I weep for neutral slumber


Denial burns a fire deep into the hours
As I evade past recollections of your touch
Floating in bitter melancholy
This eternal blending of the not easily forgotten

Slowly I begin to peel off the layers
My protective armor, now as brittle as parchment
Easily sloughed off leaving the inevitable truth
vulnerability seeps to the bone

Then words that acted as knives
Become my salve as I (defeated) apply
Wrapping myself in the old familiarities
Gently cursing you (me) for feeling so raw.